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Christopher Newport (1561–after August 15, 1617)

Christopher Newport was an
English privateer, ship captain, and adventurer who helped to establish the first
permanent English colony in
North America at Jamestown in 1607. Born the son of a shipmaster on the east coast of
England, he worked in the commercial shipping trade and, beginning in 1585, as a
privateer, or sanctioned pirate, in the war between England and Spain. His assistance
in the capture of the Spanish ship Madre de Dios in 1592 won
him such wealth and prestige that in 1606 the Virginia Company of London appointed him leader of
the voyage to the newly
chartered colony. In the first few months, he played a key role in
negotiating between Virginia's often-fractious leaders. He also sailed between the
colony and England, carrying news and delivering precious supplies. In 1608, he
participated in an unsuccessful "coronation" of the Indian chief Powhatan, who refused to submit
himself to the English. In 1609, as captain of the Sea Venture, Newport was
shipwrecked off the islands of Bermuda, arriving in Virginia the next spring. Newport
left the Virginia Company's employment in 1612 and entered the service of the East
India Company. He died in Banten (Bantam), Java, sometime after August 15, 1617. MORE...

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Early Years and Privateering

Newport was christened at Harwich, a prominent port town on the east cost of
England, on December 29, 1561. His father, also named Christopher Newport, was a
shipmaster; the maiden name of his mother, Jane, is unknown.

At about age nineteen, Newport sailed from Harwich for Brazil on November 3, 1580,
aboard the merchant vessel Minion of London. He jumped ship
with some other crewmen at Baya (Bahia), Brazil, in 1581 after a quarrel erupted
with the ship's master, Stephen Hare. Newport may have returned to England by
1582, when his name appeared on a list of shipmasters in Harwich. He married
Katherine Proctor there on October 19, 1584.

The next year, 1585, marked the beginning of a long, undeclared war between
England and Spain that eventually concluded in 1604. During the intervening years,
in accordance with international practice, England and Spain commissioned private
seafarers to prey on each other's shipping. Essentially licensed pirates, the
privateers of both sides varied in effectiveness, although a capable captain and
his men could become quite wealthy if they were fortunate enough to seize numerous
prizes while escaping death or capture. It was during this conflict—notable for
the wreck of the Spanish Armada in 1588—that Newport and several other English
privateers made their fortunes and their reputations.

By 1587, Newport was master's mate of the
privateering ship the Drake, and he sailed with Sir Francis
Drake to Cádiz, where Drake destroyed Spanish ships. Afterward, Newport's
privateer cruised the Spanish coast searching for prizes. Newport, referred to
subsequently as "of Limehouse, mariner," was master of the Margaret, out of London, in 1589. In 1590, he served in his first major
command, as captain of the Little John in a fleet that
sailed for the West Indies and Virginia. Off the northwestern coast of Cuba,
Newport lost his right arm as he tried to capture two Mexican prizes; Virginia
would have to wait.

Over the next four years, Newport made four voyages to the West Indies, continuing
in the employment of London merchants but also remaining active as a privateer.
Beginning in 1592, he captained the Golden Dragon. Because
of his growing reputation and accomplishments, he commanded a flotilla of
privateers and led attacks on Spanish towns in the Caribbean. He helped capture
the extremely rich Madre de Dios in 1592 and sailed it back
to England.

In 1595, Newport made his only voyage to the Mediterranean. That year he also
married his third wife, Elizabeth Glanville, the daughter of a leading London
goldsmith. (His first wife had died by 1590, when he married Ellen Ade, who
subsequently died.)

When Newport married into the Glanville family, his status changed from an
employee of London merchants to a partner with five of them—his brothers-in-law.
He became a one-sixth owner of the new, heavily armed trading and privateering
vessel Neptune. Between 1595 and the end of the
Anglo-Spanish War in 1604, Newport annually raided Spanish-Caribbean settlements
and ships. He became one of the most experienced ship captains in England in terms
of voyages to and from the Caribbean. After the peace treaty was signed, he turned
from privateering to trade and met equal success.

Arrival in Virginia

In 1606, the Virginia Company of London
chose Newport to lead the voyage to Virginia because of his reputation as a
"mariner well practised." (He was also named "principal master" of the Royal Navy
in 1606.) Newport took command of the Susan Constant and
received his formal instructions from the company on December 10, 1606. Because of
a lawsuit over a collision that had occurred on November 23 between the Susan Constant and the Philip and
Francis, the voyage did not get under way until December 20. On that date,
the Susan Constant, the Godspeed
(captained by Bartholomew
Gosnold), and the Discovery (captained by John
Ratcliffe) finally sailed down the Thames River on their way to Virginia.

The journey did not go well. Storms delayed the vessels off the coast of Kent for
about six weeks, long enough for a clash of egos to emerge among two of the
expedition's leaders aboard the Susan Constant. Edward Maria Wingfield
and Captain John Smith locked
horns, and after Newport sided with Wingfield, Smith was arrested and nearly
hanged at Nevis, in the West Indies. The fleet left the West Indies on April 10
and, after surviving a violent storm, finally landed at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay in Virginia on
April 26.

The landing was no less difficult. Newport
went ashore with Wingfield, Gosnold, and a group of about thirty men. They
saw
"faire meddows and goodly tall Trees, with such Fresh-waters running through the
woods," wrote George Percy,
"as I was almost ravished at the first sight thereof." The woods, however,
concealed a group of Virginia Indians who charged the newcomers as they were
returning to their ships and wounded several of them with arrows before being
driven off.

That night, according to instructions from the Virginia
Company of London, Newport opened a box that contained the names of the seven
councilmen who would elect a president and govern the colony. They included
Newport, Wingfield, Gosnold, Ratcliffe, Smith, Captain John Martin, and Captain George Kendall. Smith, however, was not allowed
to take his seat, which further strained relations among him, Newport, and the
newly elected President Wingfield.

On April 29, Newport erected a cross at
the mouth of the bay, at a place they named Cape Henry, to claim the land for the
Crown. During the next two weeks, Newport directed the exploration of the lower
Chesapeake Bay and the James
River. Despite the inauspicious first encounter with the Algonquian-speaking Indians of
Tsenacomoco, subsequent
interactions were cautiously friendly. The Englishmen took care to visit each town and greet each
chief as the ships worked their way west up the James River, which Newport learned
was navigable at least as far as the Appomattox River. After debating several
possible sites for the new settlement, the leaders decided on a marshy peninsula
they called Jamestown Island. Once a start was made there, Newport continued his
exploration of the James with a small party, sailing as far as the falls
(present-day Richmond) and
erecting a cross there to mark possession of the river westward from Cape Henry.
He and his men then sailed back to Jamestown.

When they returned on May 27, Newport discovered that several nearby Indian tribes
had attacked the settlement only the day before. He and the other leaders
immediately set the men to constructing a triangular fort with a bastion in each
corner. Although the English had driven off the attackers, the colony's leaders
anticipated stronger assaults from the Indians in the future. In addition, the
Spaniards in present-day
Florida were threatened by the English presence and inclined
to drive them off.

First Supply

Newport sailed for England on June 22, carrying an optimistic letter from the council. The
fort had been completed and a crop of wheat had been sown. Smith had been admitted
to the council, in part because Newport had played peacemaker. The abundant
resources of Virginia, in particular the rich forests, engendered optimism that
the colony would thrive and turn a profit for its investors. In the hold of the
Susan Constant, Newport carried what he and the other
leaders believed to be gold-bearing ore—the best means of quick wealth for the
investors.

After arriving in London on August 12,
however, Newport learned that the gold was in fact iron pyrite, commonly called
fool's gold. In the meantime, a series of disasters struck the colony. Illness,
salt poisoning, starvation, and occasional Indian attacks reduced the English
population by more than half over the fall and winter. Adding to the Englishmen's
woes, relations among their leaders again deteriorated. Smith negotiated with the
paramount chief Powhatan for food but was captured in December and two of his
companions were killed. When he returned to Jamestown on January 2, 1608, he was
accused of being responsible for the two colonists' deaths and sentenced to hang.
He was saved only by the arrival, that day, of Newport, with the so-called first
supply of new colonists.

Neither Newport nor Smith could save
Jamestown from disaster a few days later, however, when the fort caught fire and
practically burned to the ground along with most of the food and other supplies.
The catastrophe made the upstart Smith more vital than ever to the settlement's
survival because Powhatan regarded Smith as virtually an adopted member of his
chiefdom. It was Smith who could negotiate for the colony most
effectively. He and Newport sailed in February to Powhatan's principal town of
Werowocomoco, negotiating
with the paramount chief for corn. They returned to Jamestown on March 9 with
enough corn to see the settlement through the rest of the winter.

Once again, "gold" was found near Jamestown, and on April 10, 1608, his hold
filled, Newport sailed for England. He arrived in London on May 21, but the gold
once more proved false. During the summer, while Newport received additional
instructions from the company and gathered more supplies and settlers, Smith
undertook two voyages of exploration in the Chesapeake Bay. He established trading
relations with numerous tribes both inside and outside Tsenacomoco, learned the
approximate locations of mineral deposits (but no gold mines), satisfied himself
that there was no "northwest passage" between the bay and the Pacific Ocean, and
began drafting a comprehensive map of the Chesapeake. On September 10, Smith—who
twice had faced death sentences from the council—was elected president. He quickly
set about preparing the colony for the approaching winter.

Second Supply

In September 1608, Newport reappeared in
Virginia with the second supply of colonists. His instructions were to search for
any survivors of the Lost Colony
of Roanoke, resume exploring for gold mines, and stage a "coronation" of
Powhatan, making him a "sub-king" under James I. Smith objected to these instructions as
unrealistic, and while the coronation was carried out, it became a farce. First,
Powhatan refused to come to Jamestown, insisting that he already was a king in his
own country and that the English could come to him if they wished to have a
ceremony. (Powhatan, of course, already considered the English settlers to be a
sort of sub-tribe under his authority; from his point of view, they survived only
because of his beneficence.)

Newport, Smith, and a retinue duly made
the trek to Werowocomoco, where they induced Powhatan to "bow" and receive his
"crown" by "leaning hard" on his shoulders. In exchange for the crown and other
gifts, Powhatan gave Newport an old pair of shoes and his "mantle" (perhaps the
garment that currently resides in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England).
Afterward, Newport searched briefly for the Lost Colonists and gold mines, but to
no avail. He then set sail for England. Instead of gold, his ships bore more
practical products of the settlers' labors: clapboard, wainscot, "pitch, tarre,
glasse, frankincense, and sope ashes." He arrived in London in mid-January
1609.

Third Supply

On May 23, 1609, the king issued a new charter for the
Virginia Company of London to allow for reorganization and additional capital.
Early in June, Newport sailed again for Virginia, this time as captain of the Sea Venture, the flagship of a nine-ship flotilla that
represented the so-called third supply. Newport's vessel also carried Sir Thomas Gates, the new,
Crown-appointed governor; Sir George
Somers, admiral of the fleet; and William Strachey, who later became secretary of
the colony. Avoiding the Spanish West Indies, the fleet sailed on as direct a
course to Virginia as possible. Stifling heat and disease troubled the passengers
and crew, but they were nothing compared to the violent three-day storm that struck on July
24, when the ships were about a week's voyage from their destination. The
hurricane scattered the fleet and drove the Sea Venture
onto a reef off the islands of Bermuda.

The Shipwreck That
Saved Jamestown: The Sea
Venture Castaways and the Fate
of America

For the next eight months, as
the other ships straggled into Jamestown, Gates, Somers, and Newport struggled to
maintain order among the passengers and crew of the Sea
Venture. Remarkably, all had lived through the shipwreck, but several did
not survive the dissentions, intrigues, and charges of mutiny that surfaced in
Bermuda and resulted in executions ordered by Gates. On
February 11, 1610, Newport and William Strachey served as witnesses to the christening
of John Rolfe's daughter, named
Bermuda, and on March 25, Newport, Strachey, and James Swift became godfathers to
a baby boy called Bermudas. (Rolfe's wife and daughter both died.) In May 1610,
the party finally departed the islands in two small vessels that ship carpenters
and crew had cobbled together from local
trees and fragments salvaged from the wreck. They arrived in Jamestown later in
the month and found disaster.

Having endured the Starving
Time over the winter, the few remaining colonists at Jamestown were
barely alive. Most of the buildings had been burned for firewood, and the palisade
surrounding the fort was down. To the relief of many there, Gates announced they
would abandon Jamestown. On June 7, the survivors boarded ships and sailed down
the James River to the Chesapeake Bay, where they spent the night. The next
morning, while waiting for the tide to turn, they spied a longboat headed toward
them from the east. It was the advance of an expedition led by the new, Virginia
Company–appointed governor, Thomas West, twelfth baron De La Warr.
On his orders, the colonists turned around.

De La Warr had brought with him more
settlers, soldiers, and a year's worth of provisions. Most important, he brought a
strict regimen of order and discipline, confirming and reinforcing a set of rules
that came to be known as the Lawes Divine, Morall and Martiall. Newport
returned to England by September, while De La Warr, who had fallen ill, set sail
for home in March 1611.

In the spring of 1611, Newport sailed to Virginia for the last time, taking Sir Thomas Dale with him, and
arrived on May 12. Dale, the marshal of Virginia and acting governor in De La
Warr's and Gates's absence, ran the colony strictly and helped the English finally
defeat the Indians in the First Anglo-Powhatan War (1609–1614). Newport remained in Virginia for
several months, overseeing the construction of a bridge at Jamestown. He sailed
for England about the end of August and arrived there late in October.

After Virginia

In 1612, Newport took up the Royal Navy post of "principal master" to which he had
been appointed in 1606 and also entered the service of the East India Company. He
made three long voyages over the next few years. The first, aboard the Expedition of London to Banten (also called Bantam), a major
trading town on the west coast of Java, was undertaken early in 1613. The second,
to India, was made in 1615. Newport wrote his will on November 16, 1616, as he was
about to sail to the East Indies for the third time. He took his son, also named
Christopher Newport, with him as his master's mate. In May 1617, Captain Newport
arrived at Saldanha Bay north of Cape Town, South Africa, and then sailed around
the Cape of Good Hope. He dropped anchor at Banten on August 15. He died soon
afterward.

Newport's legacy lives on in Virginia, where
his name is most famously associated with the city of Newport News. On an unknown date, the Virginia
Company granted Newport thirty-two shares of stock worth £400. After he died, the
grant was converted into 1,600 acres of land in Virginia, along with another 300
acres for six men whom his widow claimed as headrights in 1619. Presumably, the
land was located in the area of present-day Newport News. Not all accounts of the
origins of the city's name involve Newport, however. The captain's name was also
given to Christopher
Newport College (later University), founded in 1961 in Newport News.

Time Line

December 29, 1561
- Christopher Newport is christened at Harwich, England. He is the son of Christopher Newport, a shipmaster.

1580
- Christopher Newport jumps ship at Bahia, Brazil, while serving on the Minion of London.

October 19, 1584
- Christopher Newport marries Katherine Proctor.

1587
- Christopher Newport serves as a privateer against the Spanish for English merchants. He is a master's mate on John Watts's ship the Drake during an attack on the Spanish port city of Cádiz.

1589
- Christopher Newport is the master of the ship the Margaret, of London, the property of merchant Robert Cobb and others.

1591
- Christopher Newport, again sailing for John Watts, is promoted to captain of the Little John. He makes his first privateering trip to the Caribbean and loses his right arm while engaging two Spanish treasure ships off Cuba. He also takes part in the Barbary Coast trade.

1592–1595
- Christopher Newport is made captain of the Golden Dragon, owned by John Moore, and sails in the West Indies.

1592
- Christopher Newport commands a flotilla of privateers and attacks Spanish towns in the Caribbean. Near the Azores, he helps to capture the very rich Spanish ship Madre de Dios and sails it back to England.

1595
- Christopher Newport marries Elizabeth Glanville, a London goldsmith's daughter. Soon after, he partners with her brothers and others as one-sixth owner of the heavily armed ship the Neptune.

1595–1603
- As captain of the ship the Neptune, Christopher Newport raids Spanish towns in the Caribbean.

1604
- Christopher Newport's privateering career ends when a peace agreement is signed between England and Spain.

1606
- Christopher Newport receives a post as a master of the Royal Navy. The Virginia Company of London gives him command of its first fleet to sail to Virginia.

December 20, 1606
- Three ships carrying 104 settlers sail from London bound for Virginia. Christopher Newport captains the Susan Constant, Bartholomew Gosnold the Godspeed, and John Ratcliffe the Discovery.

April 26, 1607
- Jamestown colonists first drop anchor in the Chesapeake Bay, and after a brief skirmish with local Indians, begin to explore the James River.

May 21–27, 1607
- Captain Christopher Newport, Captain John Smith, George Percy, and others explore the James River, making mostly friendly contact with the Kecoughtans, the Paspaheghs, the Quiyoughcohannocks, and the Appamattucks.

May 26, 1607
- While Christopher Newport and a party of colonists explore the James River, an alliance of five Algonquian-speaking Indian groups—the Quiyoughcohannocks, the Weyanocks, the Appamattucks, the Paspaheghs, and the Chiskiacks—attacks Jamestown, wounding ten and killing two.

June 22, 1607
- Christopher Newport departs from Jamestown for England, carrying a letter to the Virginia Company of London that exaggerates the Virginia colony's commercial possibilities.

August 12, 1607
- Christopher Newport arrives in London.

January 2, 1608
- John Smith returns to Jamestown after being held captive by Powhatan. Only thirty-eight colonists survive, Smith's seat on the Council is occupied by Gabriel Archer, and the Council accuses Smith of killing his companions. Smith is sentenced to hang, but the charge is dropped when Christopher Newport arrives with the first supplies from England.

February 1608
- Christopher Newport and John Smith visit Powhatan, the paramount chief of Tsenacomoco, at his capital, Werowocomoco. Powhatan feeds them and their party lavishly, and Newport presents the chief with a suit of clothing, a hat, and a greyhound. The English continue upriver to visit Opechancanough at the latter's request.

April 10, 1608
- Aboard the John and Francis, Christopher Newport leaves Jamestown for England. Among those with him are Gabriel Archer, Edward Maria Wingfield, and the Indian Namontack.

September 1608
- Christopher Newport returns from England with a plan to improve relations with Virginia Indians by bestowing on Powhatan various gifts and formally presenting him with a decorated crown. The subsequent crowning is made awkward by Powhatan's refusal to kneel, and relations sour.

December 1608
- Christopher Newport returns to England from Jamestown accompanied by the Indian Machumps. John Smith, meanwhile, attempts to trade for food with Indians from the Nansemonds to the Appamattucks, but on Powhatan's orders they refuse.

Mid-January 1609
- Christopher Newport arrives in London.

May 23, 1609
- The Crown approves a second royal charter for the Virginia Company of London. It replaces the royal council with private corporate control, extends the colony's boundaries to the Pacific Ocean, and installs a governor, Sir Thomas West, twelfth baron De La Warr, to run operations in Virginia.

June 2, 1609
- The largest fleet England has ever amassed in the West—nine ships, 600 passengers, and livestock and provisions to last a year—leaves England for Virginia. Led by the flagship Sea Venture, the fleet's mission is to save the failing colony. Sir Thomas Gates heads the expedition.

July 24, 1609
- A hurricane strikes the nine-ship English fleet bound for Virginia on a rescue mission. The flagship Sea Venture is separated from the other vessels and irreparably damaged by the storm.

Winter 1609–1610
- While the English colonists starve in Virginia, the shipwrecked crew and passengers of the Sea Venture make camp in Bermuda. They build two new boats, the Patience and Deliverance, from Bermuda cedar and the scavenged remains of the Sea Venture.

February 11, 1610
- Captain Christopher Newport and William Strachey serve as witnesses to the christening of John Rolfe's daughter, named Bermuda after the group of islands on which they are stranded. The girl and her mother both die.

March 25, 1610
- Captain Christopher Newport, William Strachey, and James Swift become godfathers to a baby boy called Bermudas after the group of islands on which they are stranded.

May 24, 1610
- The party of Virginia colonists headed by Sir Thomas Gates, , now aboard the Patience and Deliverance, arrives at Jamestown. They find only sixty survivors of a winter famine. Gates decides to abandon the colony for Newfoundland.

September 1610
- Christopher Newport returns to England.

May 12, 1611
- Christopher Newport arrives at Jamestown for the last time, bringing Sir Thomas Dale with him.

August 20, 1611
- Christopher Newport sails from Virginia.

October 1611
- Christopher Newport arrives in England.

1612
- Christopher Newport assumes his Royal Navy post of 1606 and enters the service of the East India Company.

1613
- Christopher Newport sails to Banten (Bantam), Java.

1615
- Christopher Newport sails to India.

November 16, 1616
- Christopher Newport writes his will. About to sail for the third time to the East Indies, he takes his son Christopher Newport with him as master's mate.

May 1617
- Christopher Newport arrives at Saldanha Bay north of Cape Town, South Africa.

Contributed by John Salmon, historian for Virginia Civil War Trails, and author of The Official Virginia Civil War Battlefield Guide. He also helped author the National Park Service's Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail Feasibility Study and Environmental Assessment (2006).